


Untitled (Unseen)

by Highsmith (quimtessence)



Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: Future Fic, Gen, Not Prime Time 2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-04
Updated: 2018-07-04
Packaged: 2019-06-05 03:26:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15161537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quimtessence/pseuds/Highsmith
Summary: Deep down, Sarah had always known they'd be there again.





	Untitled (Unseen)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reeby10](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reeby10/gifts).



It's been more years than she's like to count these days.

The morning coffee in her cup is lukewarm and her hand keeps touching the cup, feeling the last remnants of warmth. It's too early to think her big ideas and definitely too early to rethink her life. She does her rethink in the evenings, when the shadows are deep and the wind knocks against her window.

Work can wait this morning. She likes that she can do that now, barely over thirty now. She's not her own boss yet, but it's getting there. Professional hair. Silk stockings. Paperwork everywhere. The world drowning in paper.

She drains her coffee and goes back inside her flat. She's been calling it that lately in order to get used to the English way of things. Lonson needs to become home if she wants to survive it sixteen-hour work days are expected and she wants to reach the hump and jump over it, wants to make this city home and be happy and content here.

Flat.

Lift.

Fuck. (Pretty universal.)

If she wants to make it in time she needs to leave pretty much now. And then her eye shifts and it's fifteen years ago, somewhere only she knew and then had forgotten. Sarah blinks and he's there again. She'll definitely be late.

An ill-lit room suddenly illuminated by a garland of light. The creamy navy of the pre-dawn sky had no chance against the celestial body of Jareth's existence. Sarah's eyes take a second to adjust properly. She doesn't feel afraid or torn or anything she would have expected. Fifteen years.

"Hello, Jareth." He let her speak first.

"Miss me?"

She scoffs. "Hardly."

He looks and feels the same. She's the one who has changed, and she feels this painfully yet unavoidably in every sinew.

Maybe that's how it's going to be. How it was always going to be. In and out of her life every fifteen years or so. Charming smile and not a line on his face changed. The urge to go beyond the rules, to behave not as she has behaved up to that point, is strong.

"What do you want, Jareth?" Keep saying his name. Keep saying it and you're in control. Keep up the charade that you've moved past all this. Just. Keep. Saying. The. Words. "I don't have time for this." That's it.

"Now, now. Don't lie to me. Or do. I'll find out anyway. You summoned me again, Sarah. I am purely here to do your bidding, as always."

This... could be bad. Sarah weighs her options. She's better at that now. Not being an adolescent does wonders to your decision-making skills.

"I did not summon you." Clear. Succinct. Sarah still needs to find the trap. There's always a trap. Jareth thought her that.

"You did. You always do. I chose to show up this time around. It's nice seeing you, too."

It would be infuriating if it weren't the worst time to become angry.

After fifteen years or growing up and dealing with life on her own terms, Sarah has learnt some vital lessons: Don't poke a dragon. Never think you're truly in control until the very last. Don't let the anger win. Jareth seems bent on destroying all her hard-won principles. Not surprising, in a way.

Enough pleasantries. "What do you want, actually?"

"Want? Want? Why, to serve you, of course. It's what I've always wanted."

"And the price?"

"You know the price." Right.

Normal. It needs to be normal and casual. She's not in control if she scrambling for words in front of him. She'll be late to work. Paperwork won't create itself.

She moves around her room and leaves him by the French windows. She doesn't want to show hesitation, so she stalls. Dressing and undressing in front of him is far too vulnerable. Might be necessary to show how unconcerned she is.

"I'm good at this point. No servitude necessary, thanks." She sounds vaguely annoyed, but she doubts there are any non-minion people in this universe Jareth doesn't bring that out in.

"You need to be careful whom you invite, Sarah. I've always thought so."

"Again, I didn't invite you. Not then and certainly not now."

"And yet here I am."

"Of your own volition."

"Of your asking."

"No such thing."

"Dreams count, my dear."

That does stop her in her tracks.

"Dreams have always counted," he continues. "Whether they're dreams in the night or a stray thought taking root in the harsh light of day, it's all the same to me."

"We are not ha--"

"Having this conversation? You'll find that we are. I am here because your dreams summoned me. Sarah Williams, know thyself."

*

The coffee was stone-cold and the cup brimming.

Sarah came to with a jolt. French windows open behind her. Late to work for sure. London traffic below her. A dream. A dream of Jareth.

There had been many of those throughout the years. Too many years to count, but she was going to count them anyway. Fifteen and counting. Every once in a while he comes to her in her dreams. She thought for a time she had outgrown this childish compulsion to relive, maybe just recreate, that one incident in her youth that had been the dividing line. Before Jareth and After Jareth. She should have known better.

This too she will think behind her comes tomorrow, next week, next year. This too shall pass, she'll think to herself.

She didn't hurry to get ready to leave for work. The commute would usually constitute more than enough time to think and overthink and muse on yet another dream of Jareth, but she found herself not in a hurrying mood.

Her keys were nowhere to be found until they suddenly were.

*

Somewhere, in the centre of a maze, a proverbial labyrinth, he sat on his throne. Globes of light swished through the air and the air crackled with it.

There was no reason to keep waiting. The dream had burst. But Jareth always gave it a little more time. They had all the time in the world, after all


End file.
